[to the developers] suggested balance change for longnail/mark of pride

[redspot]

So, I've play many hours of Hollow Knight and enjoy the charm system. However, I feel that the reach charms are too valuable. During a many Trial runs, I found that dealing with flying enemies or pogo-ing to be signifactly more difficult without reach.

In addition, I've watched many "lets play"-ers, basically never use the charm system because they always want compass + longnail + mark of pride, which takes up 6 notches. That is why i feel that the price/convenience/etc of reach charms is really a tax. You'll struggle without them or be disincentivised to use any other charms.

To really believe this, take a survey: anyone reading this, did you ignore the charm system because longnail/mark of pride were just too good?

So, here is my balance suggestion: make longnail cost 1 notch and mark of pride cost 2 notches. I believe that is this is actually better than making them non-charm upgrades, like nailmaster's arts, because you can unequip them for other more interesting or needed charms for say boss fights where reach is not needed. And, it reduces the "tax" on using the two most demanded charms.

Anyone else have any thoughts on those two charms? did you ever feel panicked when they weren't equiped and started looking for a bench? Are they "necessary" or just "very useful, almost all the time"? Did you basically ignore the charm system because those two were universally useful?

[HexaDecimatoR]

If they're that common, I'd see it as too common and that they'd need a drawback of sorts. Perhaps a reduction to how quickly you could swing your Nail with those charms equipped?

I feel that the Nail length charms along with Qiuck Slash and Stalwart Shell are too popular/overpowered and maybe need to be adjusted, too. It becomes a problem when someone can't play the game without them.

[CJones]

Originally posted by Pure Perfection:

Longnail and Mark of Pride is a horrible combonation. The distance given just isn't worth 5 charm notches.

Actually it's ridiculously good in the Colloseum, particularly the Trial of the Fool. My first time beating it was with LN+MoP+Quick Slash+Nailmaster's Glory+Steady Body. The ridiculous range makes the no floor part in particular much easier.

Not so much anywhere else though.

If anything is too good, it's Quick Slash. And that's already been nerfed once.

[bee3001]

I personally never used Longnail/Mark of Pride because I never wanted to become relient on the increased range such that I would struggle when I switch to a different charm setup. I found that the charged attack had ridiculous enough range already and with Nailmaster's Glory, it charges near instantaniously.

Imo, Fragile Strength is OP, especially when used with Quickslash and Stalward Shell. I can understand that the Fragile charms are so OP because of the risk of breaking them upon death, but perhaps making them cost MUCH more geo to repair and nerfing/Disabling them in Steel Soul runs might balance it a bit better.

[Hedrack]

I like using Mark of Pride if I have the space, but I usually prefer Fragile Strength. If I'm using charms at all my setup is something like Fragile Strength, Fragile Heart, Quick Slash, and Longnail. If I don't care about extra health then I'll switch out Longnail for Mark of Pride and use Thorns or Grubsong.

The range charms help and can make things easier, but they aren't necessary to win. The only boss I found them really good for was Dung Defender/White Defender since when he throws his balls of dung he has a pretty good attack range which I tend to get hit by without range charms.

[Firebee]

Range charms kinda useless for me in combat. But they quite useful when do platforming more range = higher nail bounce. Anyway some charms in HK kinda useless or underpower due to their high charm notch cost and their ability unimpressive. I hope balance some charms or make some charms more useful instead of "some collectibles you need to complete 100% game progress" in the next free pack.

[CJones]

Flukenest was buffed in the last patch. It's actually very powerful against certain bosses. Fury of the Fallen had it's damage increased from +150% to +175%. I still think it should be a 1 notch charm though.

[Darc Vader]

I rarely use either of them, with the exception of my first playthrough. The extra range is nice, but there are so few cases where it's more than a minor buff (imo at least). For nail bouncing Mark of Pride is useful, but Quick Slash gives you a similar margin of error while being miles better for combat.

bee3001 also makes 2 good points. 1. Getting too used to the range can actually make fights where the range doesn't matter more difficult, simply because you either whiff more attacks, or can't make space for more useful charms.
2. Nail arts are unaffected by the range buffs, and, especially in late game areas (ie coliseum) you can easily get more bang for you buck from Nailmaster's Glory.

Charms I would use over Longnail/MoP almost every time:
Spell Twister
Shaman Stone
Quick Slash
Nailmaster's Glory
Grubsong
Fragile Strength
Soul Catcher/Eater
Sharp Shadow

[natsu_T]

I completely disagree that those charms are that good. On my first playthrough, I was indeed enamored by MoP. But during my subsequent playthroughs, I realized just how much of a crutch it was and how much better other charms were. If you tweak your playstyle a bit, nailmaster's glory will give you more range and more power. You won't be nail pogo-ing as much like this, but it offers supreme mastery over horizontal space and enemies slightly above you.

Full-on spellcaster builds are also insanely good, and are in my opinion overall superior to any other fighting style. The more I play Hollow Knight, the more I've learned to rely on the nail as little as possible.

Also, you seem to be thinking that you should use both MoP and Longnail at the same time. That is a huge mistake. If you actually measure out the distance, Longnail (when combined with MoP) gives you literally a pixel's extra range. Longnail is decent when used without MoP, but if you combine them, you experience severe diminishing returns. I think most of your success is purely psychological. These charms are a beginner's trap, although they are great to strap on in the early-mid game at times. Later on, I tend to use all manner of other combos like Hiveblood + Womb. Or spore shroom spam with quick/deep focus, defender's crest, thorns. Or rapid striking with quick slash, steady body, stalwart shell, etc. Or just being an all-around brute with fragile heart + strength, nail glory, soul eater, etc.

[Darc Vader]

Originally posted by natsu_T:

Full-on spellcaster builds are also insanely good, and are in my opinion overall superior to any other fighting style. The more I play Hollow Knight, the more I've learned to rely on the nail as little as possible

This. So much this. I've reached the point where I prefer Dream Wielder over many charms, when I originally thought it almost useless. The extra soul and quicker use means a single dream nail + shade soul is way more efficient than a nail hit or 2.

[CJones]

Originally posted by natsu_T:

Also, you seem to be thinking that you should use both MoP and Longnail at the same time. That is a huge mistake.

Like I said earlier, LN+MoP is extremely good in the colloseum. In any other situation, not so much.

Full-on spellcaster builds are also insanely good, and are in my opinion overall superior to any other fighting style. The more I play Hollow Knight, the more I've learned to rely on the nail as little as possible.

I use Shaman Stone+Spell Twister most of the time. Againt most bosses, magic is more useful than healing.

Recently I've been experimenting with Dream Wielder+Glowing Womb, just for fun. I can confirm, you can beat the 1st Trial using just this, and no Nail or Magic. It takes a while though. Glowing Womb really needs to do more damage.

[Darc Vader]

Originally posted by CJones:

Originally posted by natsu_T:

Also, you seem to be thinking that you should use both MoP and Longnail at the same time. That is a huge mistake.

Like I said earlier, LN+MoP is extremely good in the colloseum. In any other situation, not so much.

Full-on spellcaster builds are also insanely good, and are in my opinion overall superior to any other fighting style. The more I play Hollow Knight, the more I've learned to rely on the nail as little as possible.

I use Shaman Stone+Spell Twister most of the time. Againt most bosses, magic is more useful than healing.

Recently I've been experimenting with Dream Wielder+Glowing Womb, just for fun. I can confirm, you can beat the 1st Trial using just this, and no Nail or Magic. It takes a while though. Glowing Womb really needs to do more damage.

I think a good way to buff Glowing Womb would be to put in more synergies a la Defender's Crest. Make things like permanent loss of a third of your soul for a single constant source of damage, or at least make it affected by Shaman Stone.

[jabberwok]

Honestly, I did ignore other combinations for a while because I assumed I would find those two to always be the best. But then I started branching out, and found out I was completely wrong. There are a ton of great combos, even for just the colosseum, and the threads I've read on it here just confirm that. People have found different stuff that works for them. And I've used different builds depending on the situation. I've had a lot of success with healing focused builds, with maximizing damage, or soul, etc. Mark of Pride is really handy against flying enemies especially, but I think the range boost is less crucial if you can use nail arts well instead, which already have a long range. For that reason, I started treating Nailmaster's Glory as more indispensable than MoP, and that gave me a lot of room to try other stuff.